Bisomus

A Bisomus is a tomb large enough to contain two bodies. The ordinary tombs (loci) in the galleries of the Roman catacombs contained one body. It sometimes happened, however, that a space large enough to contain two bodies was excavated. Such a double grave is referred to in inscriptions as locus bisomus. An inscription from the catacomb of St. Calixtus, for instance, informs us that a certain Boniface, who died at the age of twenty-three years and two months, was interred in a double grave which had been prepared for himself and for his father (Bonifacius, qui vixit annix XXII et II (mens) es, positus in bisomum in pace, sibi et patr. suo). A 4th century inscription tells of two ladies who had purchased for their future interment, a bisomus in a "new crypt" which contained the body of a Saint:

IN CRYPTA NOBA RETRO SAN

CTUS EMERVM VIVAS BALER

RA ET SABINA MERUM LOC

V BISOM AB APRONE ET A

BIATORE

Like so many pious but rather superstitious persons of that age, "Balerra" and "Sabina" wished to be buried in the closest proximity to a martyr, retro sanctos, a privilege which, as we learn from another inscription, "many desire but few receive" (quod multi cupiunt et rari accipiunt).

Wikisource has the text of the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia article Bisomus.

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "^{article name needed}". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton.